108 "Overwhelmed by School Assessments? Discover the Secrets to Advocating for Your Teen!"

 #ParentAdvocate #SpecialEducation #SchoolSystem #ParentingTeens

In this episode of WTF: Welcome to Friday, we dive into the world of special education and the unique challenges parents face when advocating for their children in the school system. Drawing from over 25 years of experience in both public and private education, Cheryl shares her insights on how to effectively navigate the complexities of educational assessments, accommodations, and communication with schools. Discover the importance of being "on the fence" and how this perspective can bridge the gap between parents and educators, ensuring the success and well-being of our children. Whether you're a parent overwhelmed by a 30-page psychological assessment or a teacher seeking to understand accommodations better, this episode offers valuable advice and support.

wtf on the fence.m4a
Transcript generated by Transcript LOL
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Speaker 1
00:04 - 00:37
Welcome to another episode of WTF. That's welcome to Friday or Whatever you choose it to be is totally your decision But I might be saying WTF what took me so long to get here. I'm usually launching this on Friday mornings I do a quick rip for a few minutes and that's that's the podcast for Fridays today was just one of those crazy Fridays where I just couldn't find 10 minutes to sit down. So here we are.

Speaker 1
00:37 - 00:44
It's like quarter to nine Friday night, but I still made it. It's still welcome to Friday. It's not welcome to Saturday. So I'm proud.

Speaker 1
00:44 - 00:58
I get down. I did it honestly. This is like the joy of my life. I cannot tell you how much I love doing this podcast, whether it's with experts or just me riffing on something.

Speaker 1
00:58 - 01:09
And I love doing the Fridays now because I can just talk about whatever and there's no guidelines. It's just me. No filter, no edits, no cuts, no nothing. Just me.

Speaker 1
01:10 - 02:03
So Welcome to Friday is a spin-off of Wednesday's episodes of Parenting Teens Advice Redefined and so sometimes the topic is that sometimes it's not. Today it is and the reason I wanted to talk about this today is I got I spent about 25 years at one specific school as the spec ed supervisor of all the special education department and worked with many, many, many teachers, went through many rounds of administrators and obviously worked with thousands of kids. And every once in a while, even for after leaving there in 2020, I get messages from former teachers, former colleagues, educational assistants, asking for advice.

Speaker 1
02:04 - 02:17
And Cheryl, you know. I got a kid in my classroom, and I want to talk about this. I'm not sure what to do. Or I'm having a union issue, or I have a problem with another colleague.

Speaker 1
02:18 - 02:26
I'm not sure about the decision to make head of department or admin, or I'm not sure. Do you have some advice for me? You've got a few minutes. And I can't tell you.

Speaker 1
02:28 - 02:33
how much joy that brings me. And it always starts with, oh, you know, sorry to bother you, Cheryl. Never. It's never a problem.

Speaker 1
02:34 - 03:29
Because I love to talk about this stuff. And after being in the public system for 25 years, and then in the private system for three years, It really gave me a whole roundabout perspective on different areas of special education, the needs, the funding, the families, what's accessible, what's not accessible. I got a lot of Information and I didn't I don't realize actually until somebody asked me a question that Perhaps I have the answer and it's great and I love it Keep them coming if you worked with me and you want to ask a question keep them coming and I don't always have the answer obviously, but It just nothing brings me more joy than to try to help somebody through a situation that I've probably gone through in in all those years.

Speaker 1
03:30 - 04:14
So the other side of that is, as you know, I am your parent advocate. So if you're a parent who really just feels like they don't have a voice in the school, They feel like the teachers aren't listening. Or you're sitting at your kitchen table with a 30 page psychological educational assessment and you have no idea what it actually means and the terminology they use. And I mean, when you get a psych ed assessment, it starts with how long the gestation period was before birth.

Speaker 1
04:15 - 04:45
If there was an umbilical cord issue, if there was a C-section, if there was trauma through the birth, it starts way back there. And it has 30, 40, 60 pages of information. And it starts with the history, and then they go into how they break down every almost macro test, and then a micro test, and then scores, and percentiles, and terminology. And you have $5,000 documents sitting on your kitchen table.

Speaker 1
04:45 - 05:21
And you don't actually know what to do with it, how to manage it, how to manage taking it to the school and asking them their advice and what they can do and can't do. And I feel like it can get so, so overwhelming. And so one of the joys of my position was being able to take this assessment and sit down with the parent and start with page one and highlight what we need and get rid of what we don't and be able to say, okay, you can take this, this and this and go to the school with this.

Speaker 1
05:22 - 05:29
We can create an IEP with this. We can create accommodations. And this is a human rights thing. Your kid gets to get this.

Speaker 1
05:29 - 05:54
They are entitled. And Rarely, but sometimes these accommodations don't get put into place and parents get frustrated. I spent all this money and I thought everything was like written down and in order and explanatory and I take it to the school and the school says, oh, you know, we don't have the capacity to do this. We don't have the staff to do this.

Speaker 1
05:54 - 06:11
We don't have the funding to do this. And now you're stuck in the middle as a parent. And that's where I started realizing today, it's like, I'm sitting on the fence. And I know that term very often just means can't make a decision.

Speaker 1
06:11 - 06:15
I'm on the fence. I'm on the fence. I don't know whether to go here. I don't know whether to go there.

Speaker 1
06:15 - 06:32
I'm on the fence. But I have this unique position right now. where I'm on the fence, but I'm on the fence where I can see both sides of the yard. And I know where parents are coming from.

Speaker 1
06:32 - 07:01
I understand the frustrations. I understand the support they need. I understand what path they can take, what rights they have, what rights their kids have. But being in the school system and being a teacher for many years and then being a head of department for many years, I also know what is available and what we can do and the capacity to do it.

Speaker 1
07:01 - 07:31
And a big part of my position at the school was to be able to sit down with teachers and give them different perspectives of what a specific accommodation or modification might mean in their classroom. Sometimes teachers just get so overwhelmed the same way parents get very overwhelmed. And what comes with overwhelm is usually fear. Fear I can't do the job right.

Speaker 1
07:31 - 07:43
Fear I'm not supporting your kid. Fear I don't even know what this means. Fear I have 35 kids in my class and there's one accommodation here and over here and over here and you feel like an octopus and your hands are tied. I get it.

Speaker 1
07:43 - 08:23
I totally understand. But there's many ways to put some of these accommodations into place where it is a benefit to everyone in the classroom. And when you're in the thick of it, and you're overwhelmed, and you're exhausted, and you're getting orders pushed at you, and angry parents, and angry calls as a teacher, sometimes you just can't see your way out of the box. And that's where being on the fence is really helpful, because I see outside of the box on both sides of the yard.

Speaker 1
08:24 - 08:57
And so it's really helpful to have somebody who can come at it from the parent point of view, because that's my jam, helping parents see what is available and be able to continue to support at home so everything is. Everything is consistent for their kid. And when things don't work, what kind of communication are we using in order to find out that things aren't working in the classroom? Instead of the end of the term, oh, they failed.

Speaker 1
08:57 - 09:05
They didn't hand this in. They didn't hand this in. We don't know where this is. And it's in their bag, or it's half done, or parents didn't know.

Speaker 1
09:05 - 10:03
And it's tying all that communication piece together that can really be the answer to a lot of questions. And so being on the fence is a true benefit because who better than who better than me to be able to help everybody in the room when I've been on the fence for so long. And I have a great deal of respect and support for teachers, for administrators, for parents, and for kids. And I know sometimes when you're coming into the school as a parent and you're bringing an advocate with you, I know there are sometimes, you know, teachers can get their backs up and get nervous or get defensive because they feel like an advocate is coming in two against

Speaker 1
10:03 - 10:12
one. This parent and this advocate is coming in to attack the teacher. And that's not what we do. I mean, maybe there is advocates who do that.

Speaker 1
10:13 - 10:34
But that typically is not what an advocate does. An advocate will be able to sit on the fence, look in both yards, and decide and help support what can we bring together so we're all playing in the same yard. So there is no more fence. So we're all on the same team.

Speaker 1
10:34 - 10:47
The success of our kids is paramount, absolute paramount. And sometimes it feels like we're, you know, up against this brick wall and we have no choices. We have no options. We have no funding.

Speaker 1
10:47 - 11:03
We have no money. And then we have teachers who don't want to listen to us, or it feels like parents aren't listening to us. And it can just be this battleground of school. And then who gets the worst of it, obviously, are kids, because they feel it.

Speaker 1
11:05 - 11:21
So they go home and sometimes parents are so angry and so frustrated. And I understand the kids are at home listening to their parents slam the teachers. And then when the kids go back to school, now they have this one. My mom hates you anyway.

Speaker 1
11:21 - 11:44
My mom thinks that my mom thinks my dad, blah, blah, blah. And it just creates such a discord when we really need to all be on the same team. That is the only way we are going to get a consistent level of support and communication. So we see the successes.

Speaker 1
11:44 - 12:25
We see where we still need to work in different areas for our kids. But the whole thing is you need somebody, me or somebody else, who is literally on the fence. You don't want to bring an advocate in the school who is coming out with guns a-blazing. And you don't want teachers to sit in a room and feel attacked when they are essentially, mostly, the majority of teachers are just doing the best that they absolutely can with what they have.

Speaker 1
12:26 - 12:53
But sometimes when you bring somebody in who can think outside the box, who has different perspectives, who can kind of shed, you know what, did you think maybe we could, I don't know, try this and see what happens? And that just brings some insight and some relief to everything that's going on in the classroom. And so I just wanted to get in here on a Friday and say, WTF? Welcome to Friday.

Speaker 1
12:53 - 13:18
I hope you have a fabulous weekend. And I want you to really think about what it means to be on the fence. So when you are looking for somebody to help you as a parent, to have a voice in the school, find somebody who's on the fence, who has view, clear view of both sides of the yard. And this also speaks to teachers or administrators.

Speaker 1
13:18 - 14:18
When you are looking for somebody to come in and support a parent, Who better than to have someone who has the experiences I have, there's many of us around who have experience that I have, that have worked in the public school system with parents, with kids for many years, have worked in the private school system, but also worked with kids, worked with the family and worked as a teacher, so knows what the walk of each path is like. You're not going to get the end result you want, going in angry and accusatory and blaming. The only way you're going to get a level playing field, everybody playing in the same yard, is when you have compassion, perspective, insight, and empathy for all sides of the game.

Speaker 1
14:19 - 14:42
All players get that. So anyway, WTF have a fabulous weekend. I will see you next week. Let me know what you're thinking about, you know, if you're, if you're the parent sitting there with this 30 page document, like you have no idea how to get it in the school and get it working for you and working for your kid, drop me a message.

Speaker 1
14:42 - 14:48
We can chat. Have a beautiful, beautiful weekend. Thank you for listening. Totally appreciate you being here.

Speaker 1
14:49 - 15:02
Check out the website, CherylPakers.com and how to work with me or read free resources. Whatever you need is there and all the links for the podcast. And you want to see this on YouTube, it's there too. Bye now.